8 PECEHAM. [Vol. 1. 



explain the unusual development of color in both sexes, and 

 will sometimes override the action of natural selection in keep- 

 ing down the brightness of the female, this is evidently not 

 the case where the pigeons are concerned, since they are not 

 remarkable for activity nor pugnacity, and are notoriously liable 

 to destruction by many enemies. The further fact that the 

 male is more highly ornamented than the female, and yet 

 assists in incubation, is still more out of harmony with the 

 hypothesis. That the presence of ornaments or gaudy tints is 

 not necessarily correlated with high vitality in birds is shown 

 by the Barbets, which are " rather clumsy, fruit-eating birds," 

 and are clothed in green, diversified by the most vivid patches 

 of yellows, reds and blues.^ 



Again, in the birds of paradise there seems to be no rela- 

 tion between pugnacity and color. Mr. Wallace, in speaking 

 of the splendid Great Bird of Paradise, which he studied in the 

 Aru Islands, says that they congregate at " sdcaleli or dancing 

 parties," held in certain trees in the forest. " On one of these 

 trees a dozen or twenty fuU-plumaged male birds assemble to- 

 gether, raise up their wings, stretch out their necks, and ele- 

 vate their exquisite plumes, keeping them in a continual vi- 

 bration. Between whiles they fly across from branch to 

 branch in great excitement, so that the whole tree is filled 

 with waving plumes in every variety of attitude and motion. "- 

 Although these birds were carefully observed not a word is said 

 of their figliting nor of any display of pugnacity. In regard 

 to the Red Bird of Paradise, he mentions having kept a num- 

 ber of the magnificent male birds in the same cage ; this he 

 could not have done had they quarreled to any extent.^ He 

 also mentions " the large cage " of two specimens of the Les. 



colored." Does not the same reasoning hold good with the pigeons and a host of other 

 birds where the nest is open and the female conspicuous? A fair consideration of the 

 facts seems to us to confirm Darwin's supposition that the habit, common with bright 

 colored birds, of using covered nests was acquired after, rather than before the devel- 

 opment of the color. 



1 Tropical Nature, p. 105. 



2 Malay Archipelago, p. 446. 



3 jf-oc. cit„ p. 53G. 



